Product placement on TV: too much, too little, or who cares?

The FCC's proceeding on TV product placement ads is showing the public has …

While Nielsen research indicates that product placement advertising is thriving on television, various groups are offering the Federal Communications Commission very different perspectives on what to do about the problem, assuming they think there is one. A self-described "alcohol industry watchdog" wants a crackdown on embedded ads for booze. A Washington, DC think tank says drop the issue altogether. Public TV just wants to be kept out of the rule-making loop.

As Ars has reported, the FCC launched a proceeding in June about embedded ads. The long-awaited move came at the urging of groups like Commercial Alert, which advocates a policy of "concurrent disclosure"—TV viewers and radio listeners should see or hear an immediate message telling them that a product mentioned or shown was paid for or requested by an advertiser.

The Commission's Notice suggests that sponsoring identification announcements on TV be made "more obvious to the consumer" by requiring a specific size of lettering and a specific length for the disclosure. But beyond that, the proposal section of the item asks more questions than it offers solutions, although some of them clearly lean toward further limiting the practice on children's TV.

Lose the booze

On Friday the Marin Institute filed comments on the issue. The California-based public health group argues that, unlike Coca-Cola (product placements' hands-down winner in terms of embedded occurrences) alcohol is a "dangerous drug" that poses a serious threat to public health, causing disease, car accidents, and exacerbating domestic violence. The Institute warns that embedded ads for beer, wine, and hooch offer the "misleading" message that "drinking has no consequences" and cites imbibing scenes in Sex in the City (Absolut Vodka), and Entourage and True Blood (Budweiser beer).

"The connection between youth exposure to alcohol ads and underage drinking has been well documented," the nonprofit writes. "Quite simply, the more ads kids see, the more likely they are to drink, and to drink to excess." The group supports concurrent disclosure for alcohol-related placements, and an outright ban on them from 6am through 10pm—the same hours for which the FCC's decency rules apply.

Alien nation

But a very different perspective comes from Adam Thierer and W. Kenneth Ferree of the Progress and Freedom Foundation (Ferree is a former FCC bureau chief). The filers characterize the whole proceeding as a threat to the First Amendment rights of broadcasters, and irrelevant to boot. "If the Notice demonstrates anything, it is that a majority of the current Commissioners live in a world wholly alien and unfamiliar to most Americans;" they write, "indeed, a world long forgotten if it ever existed."

Thierer/Ferree contend that most TV watchers these days know embedded ads when they seem them, and don't need intrusive protections such as concurrent disclosure. "There can be little doubt but that viewers and listeners understand that when American Idol judges drink from Coca-Cola cups, promotional consideration was exchanged;" they write, "when a radio host talks about the great dinner he ate at Ruth’s Chris Steak House, the restaurant is a sponsor of the show; when contestants on The Biggest Loser are taught how to make desserts with 'Jell-O' gelatin, the association is not serendipitous."

Coca-Cola gets prominent placement on American Idol

Both of these filings raise serious questions about, well, the intelligence of TV viewers—to be blunt. "I believe it is important for consumers to know when someone is trying to sell them something," FCC Chair Kevin Martin declared in his press statement on the Notice. To what extent do they need the state to help them know that? One could characterize this as a debate between optimists and pessimists—the latter arguing that consumers need at least a little assistance with this problem.

Ask "the doctor"

There is lots of research on product placement awareness. Some suggests that some TV viewers, especially adolescents and teens, are quite aware of embedded ads and think that they affect others more than them. Kids in these age ranges are pretty media-savvy these days, optimists will argue, and know that they're a sought-after market. On the other hand, as one FCC Commissioner often points out, preadolescent children are far less able to distinguish between commercial and noncommercial fare.

Pessimists—such as the pessimist writing this story—will point to phenomena like the TV show Marcus Welby, M.D., one of the most successful and popular shows ever. Broadcast from 1969 through 1976, in 1970 25 percent of all American households viewed the series. The actor Robert Young's portrayal of this compassionate and empathetic doctor seemed to mirror his own personality. As a result, "Young received thousands of letters asking for advice on life's problems" from the program's fans, the TV historian Joseph Turow notes.

Did these people—drawn from a quarter of the US population—get that Marcus Welby was an actor, and not a doctor? If many didn't, it raises uncomfortable questions about what some American Idol fans may or may not understand. But even still, to what extent is that the government's problem?

Meanwhile, the Association of Public Television Stations (APTS) reminds the FCC that embedded advertising "is verboten for Public Television." While "enhanced underwriting" spots can mention the public TV sponsor, they can't hawk the sponsors' product or service. "Thus, APTS asks that any new or altered rules in this area not be applied to noncommercial educational television stations."

Participation in this proceeding has been somewhat light so far, but more comments will probably appear soon since they're due Monday, September 22. Replies to comments are due through October 22.

Further reading

File a comment with the FCC on this issue here. The docket number for field #1 ("proceeding") is 08-90.

Matthew Lasar / Matt writes for Ars Technica about media/technology history, intellectual property, the FCC, or the Internet in general. He teaches United States history and politics at the University of California at Santa Cruz.